CHAPTER XXX.

CRITICAL NOTES.--+1. Agur.+ There have been many conjectures about this person. Many consider that it is a figurative name, and some have adopted the old Jewish tradition that it is an allegorical designation of Solomon. "The name," says Delitzsch, "means _'the gathered'_" (see chap. vi. 3, x. 5), also _"the collector,"_ or the word might mean, perhaps "industrious in collecting." +The son of Jakeh,+ etc. Stuart and Zöckler adopt here the reading of Hitzig and others, and read _"The son of her who was obeyed in Massa (or the princess of Massa): I have toiled for, or carried myself about, God, and have ceased."_ For their reasons the student is referred to their commentaries, where the subject is discussed at great length. Ithiel and Ucal signify respectively _"God with me,"_ and _"the son of the mighty,"_ and the common opinion is that they were Agur's disciples. From the great differences between the language and style of the last two chapters of the book, and those which have preceded them, most scholars believe that they were written outside the land of Palestine. Zöckler thinks that "Agur and Lemuel might very properly be regarded as Arabian-Israelitish shepherd-princes or kings of a colony of Israelites of the tribe of Simeon that had emigrated to northern Arabia." (See 1 Chron. lv. 38-43; Micah i. 15, ii. 8, 10.) Delitzsch suggests that they were "Ishmaelites who had raised themselves above the religion of Abraham, and recognised the religion of Israel as its completion." +2. Brutish,+ _i.e.,_ without reason. +10.+ Stuart and Zöckler here read "Cause not a servant to slander his master." Delitzsch agrees with the English version. +15. Horseleach,+ or "_vampire,_ an imaginary spectre or ghost, supposed to suck the blood of children." _(Stuart.)_ +15+ and +16.+ On these verses, Dr. Aiken, the American translator of the Proverbs for Lange's Commentary, remarks, "As compared with the numerical proverbs which follow, the complexity and the more artificial character of the one before us at once arrests attention. They all have this in common, that whatever moral lesson they have to convey is less obvious, being hinted rather than stated. . . . In the one now under consideration, insatiable desire and the importance of its regulation seem to be the remote object. In the development, instead of the 'three things' and 'four things' which repeatedly appear afterwards, we have the 'leech,' its two daughters, the three and the four. Some have regarded the two daughters as representing physical characteristics of the bloodsucker, others as expressing by an Orientalism a doubly intense craving. Parallelism suggests making the first two of the four the two daughters; other allusions of the Scripture to the greediness of the world of the dead justify the first, while the second alone belong to human nature." +23. Odious,+ _or unloved._ +26. Conies.+ A gregarious animal of the class Pachydermata, which is found in Palestine living in the caves or clefts of the rocks. Its scientific name is _Hyrax Syriacus_. . . . It is like the Alpine marmot, scarcely the size of a domestic cat, having long hair, a very short tail, and round ears _(Smith's Biblical Dictionary)._ +28. Spider.+ Most commentators translate _"lizard."_ Delitzsch reads, _"The lizard thou canst catch with the hands, and yet it is in the king's palaces."_ +29. Go well,+ rather, "are of stately walk." +31.+ Delitzsch renders the last clause of this verse:--_"A king with whom is calling out of the host."_

NOTE.--The following is Miller's unique translation of the first four verses of this chapter with his reasons for the same, and the teaching which he sees in the passage. "It struck us that we would take the simple Hebrew and inquire its meaning. We would accept nothing as a proper name till we found it destitute of sense; and, following no intricate conceits, we would fail of a directer meaning before we went into anything more difficult. It is astonishing how facile the result. We believe that all was the work of Solomon. We believe there was no such man as _Agur,_ except that great man Jesus Christ. We believe there was no such king as _Lemuel._ We believe everything is the work of Solomon as much as any other proverb. If it appear Arabic or extra-Hebraic no matter. Solomon gathered his materials over a wide surface. We believe it is distinctly what it says, _The prophecy._ We count it as all finished in the four first verses, and _Jakeh_ and _Ithiel,_ and _Ucal_ and _Muel_ in the next chapter (verse i. 4). We would be quite willing to read it that way, if, like _Lo-ammi_ in the prophet, or _Lo-ruhamah,_ words confessedly significant (Hosea i. 8, 9), it were thought euphonious or wise to give them without a translation. But what the Hebrews saw why not our people see? Certain it is that the words to a Hebrew were about as follow:--

"1. Words of I-fear, Son of the Godly: The prophecy:-- The Strong Man speaks to God-with-me, to God-with-me and to I-am-able. 2. Forasmuch as I am more brutish as to myself, than a man of the better sort, and have not the intelligence of a common man. 3. and have not been taught wisdom and yet know the knowledge of holy things. 4. who has gone up to heaven and come down? who has gathered the winds in his fists? who has bound the waters in a garment? who has set firm all the extremities of the earth? what is his name, and what is his son's name? Because, Thou knowest.

"Let us examine, first, the language, and then the result as to the sense. _I-fear._ This is the very simplest Hebrew. It actually occurs in Deuteronomy (chap. xxxii. 27). The verb is the familiar one בדּ ך, which means primarily _to turn out of the way._ And this _turning out of the way_ for danger is a prudent and innocent character of _fear. Agur_ therefore, or _I-fear,_ with the light we get afterward, marks himself as the _Strong Man_ of the next clause; the _Son of the Godly,_ because descended out of the loins of the Church (see Rev. xii. 5); and the _Man_--just as _Muel_ (chap. xxxi. 1) is God and man--contemplating the low humanity of Christ, which is about to express its wonder at its amazing knowledge. _Godly;_ from a root meaning to venerate: _Jakeh_ is in the singular, and means the _pious one;_ which keeps in view what is too often forgotten, that Christ was not the son of the abandoned, but, as His mother expresses it (chap. xxxi. 2), the _son of my vows. The Prophecy;_ not needfully _prediction,_ as in the present case, but an _oracle, vision,_ or _inspired elation_ of any kind. The words that follow constitute _the prophecy_ for though the speech of the _Man_-Christ does not begin till the second verse, the very names in the next clause are predictive; and the most vitally so of the whole of the vision. _The Strong Man;_ strong, though weak; strong because he sees in himself such wonderful conditions. The word _strong_ is implied in the noun that is selected. _Speaks;_ oracularly. It is the solemn, poetic, and in fact, rare expression. _To-God-with-me._ That the Man-Christ should address the Deity has innumerable precedents. If it were necessary, we could imagine the Human Nature as addressing the Divine Nature; for that really occurs in high Eastern vision, in the Book of Zechariah (chap. iii. 4, 6, 7, 8). In lofty texts, like this, it is perfectly admissible. Christ speaks of His Divine Nature (John